The first blog dedicated to the proposition that Bend, Oregon really, truly, deeply and profoundly sucks.

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Sucked In by the Sucky Bend Springtease

Hopeful green shoots, April 3

Less hopeful green shoots, April 6

It happens every year: People in Bend -- even some of the old-timers, who really should know better -- get fooled into thinking "spring" has arrived in early April, when it won't truly get here for another two and a half months.

After five weeks of almost non-stop suck from late February through March, we had a spell of sunny and (relatively) warm weather that lasted about four days. Crocuses popped up. My "friends" on Facebook posted photos of their crocuses and started babbling about the gorgeous gardens they were going to have this year.

"Yesterday was like the perfect Bend weather day," chirped Duncan McGeary, one of the old-timers who definitely should know better than to be chirping, on April 2.

Then -- wham! -- winter smacked us upside the head again. As I write this the temperature is in the 30s and the forecast calls for a "wintry mix" of scattered rain and snow (most likely graupel too).

What makes "spring" weather in Bend even harder to take are the imbeciles -- typically the skiers and snowboarders -- who revel in its suckiness and yammer about how they wish the winter would never end.

One of them was a Facebook "friend" of mine until this morning, when he posted yet another comment about how delightful Bend's endless winter is. I unfriended him. I just couldn't take any more of that crap.

The Bend "spring" is a shameless tease. She lets you buy her drinks, flirts with you, smiles at you, winks at you, puts her hand on your knee, gets you all hot and bothered ... and then walks out of the bar with some other guy.

15 comments:

The Bend "spring" is a shameless tease. She lets you buy her drinks, flirts with you, smiles at you, winks at you, puts her hand on your knee..,"

( Analogy perfected )

What is really not -fair- is when you describe your perfectly rational need for a reprieve from The Drear and the Helenites gawk at you like you're openly fantasizing about every depraved act imaginable!

No. Wishing for just one week, day ( a handful of 'hours'? ) respite from the relentless Chinese Water Torture is -not- the same as sharing s@xual fantasies w/ strangers at a Bus Stop.

So stop giving me those faux-shocked, barbed looks. In FACT, where the cheerleaders are concerned, probably IS less offensive to make an wholly inappropriate comment/advance than to simply admit Our.Weather.Sucks.

There are a few of us that don't consider the child-like desire for an occasional glimpse of The Sun a form of perversion? Least not yet.

HA! That's great! After living in various places on the East Coast and California, the provincialism of Oregonians was painfully apparent when we moved here in '85. The state is a little less provincial now (thanks largely to the influx of Californians, whom, of course, the "natives" loathe) but the "natives" still are "hyper-sensitive to the slightest criticism of their native (rain-soaked habitat) manner of dress or local customs." I think that's a sign of an inferiority complex.

Some years ago, somebody on another blog (now extinct) tried to insult me by saying I was "not Bend material." My reply was, "Thank you."

Unfortunately for 'me', at the end of the day, I'm a Sales guy! For years... I was uber-cautious not to offend anyone. Hey, could be a client down the road?

Finally came to dreadful conclusion that, laboring under the same delusions does -not- a kinship MAKE! No matter how loudly you complain about CA's etc., 'they' complained FIRST! So why join in on the Slam-fest?

Our daughters however, are treated entirely different. To a degree I understand the insular nature of Smalltown OR. BUT this mentality is common in the Rose City as well. In many cases, you're just a 'placeholder'. I've had clients DUMP me the -minute- their neice got out of college and onboard w/ Merrill Lynch etc! Gee, glad to be of loyal service all those years?

Uh... so which one are we 'closer' to? The Record High or the Record LOW!?

Also notice the YEAR for the High. Hint, it's the last Normal summer we HAD. Jan & Feb were the Flood of '96. Hasn't been the same since. I know, just cherry pickin' data. It's all 'good' and we're just 'whiners'.

Quit yer bitchin!..It could be worse..We could be living downwind from four outta control nuc reactors & those little graupels could be loaded with cesium 137, strontium 90 and radioactive iodine....Does anyone know where they sell geiger counters and potassium iodide in Bend?

Our in-laws spend every weekend at their beach house near Pacific City. Just emailed me all the Kiran Beer containers and all the other Japanes-language debris!

Sad but kind of interesting at the same time. He mentioned there's stuff washing up from WA to Cali.

Ahem.., another drab/so-so weekend here in the Valley. Thankfully most of The Drear was held at bay long enough to help the kids work on their newly purchased repo home without tracking 'too' much mud in?

Ripping out pet-stained, drear- infested 'carpet' and applying liberal applications of Kilz after washing walls bare of gag-inducing mildew was a real scream. Funny to note it only took about eight months of abandonment for our "ideal climate" to almost completely ERASE any sign of an attempt by man to settle it!

Sorry you guys missed it? Another few weeks and the perma-encroaching blackberries and under-growth might have consumed it whole?

We were up in Scotts Mills at around 1,000 feet. There were decent patches but my SIL and I were working the Simple Green cleaner and Murphy's Oil soap on their woods floors.

I had a flannel shirt, vest and cap on most of the day. It was quite chilly actually. We cleaned up barely in time ( running a tad late to be truthful ) to attend a wedding in Mt. Angel. We were as exhausted from the weather I believe as we were from the work.

Pummeling graupel this afternoon in the Valley. As far North as Wilsonville I'm told?

Ok, at what point do we stop frantically thumbing thru our "Springtime excuses for Oregon's Crappy Weather" saying, Well, Spring has just barely 'started'!

And... start owning up to the fact that we're halfway to MAY!? Now correct me if I'm wrong here but isn't May generally considered one of the most 'ideal' months just about anywhere else in the Lower 48?

At which point do we toggle over to our "Excuses for Oregon's Crappy Weather" ( Summer EDITION! )?